Metro News & Reviews

Jaime de la Vega nominated as chief of city of Los Angeles’ transportation agency

Some interesting news from the office of Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa: he has nominated deputy mayor Jaime de la Vega for the job of general manager of the city’s Department of Transportation.

The city of L.A. is, of course, the largest in Los Angeles County by leaps and bounds and is heavily involved in Metro’s existing transit and road programs.

And, of course, the Department of Transportation will play a big role in the planning and execution of some big Measure R transit projects that will be located either exclusively or partially in Los Angeles. Among them: the Westside Subway Extension, the Regional Connector, the Crenshaw/LAX Line, the second phase of the Expo Line, the Orange Line busway extension, San Fernando Valley north-south bus improvements and a to-be-defined transit project to span the Sepulveda Pass and link the Valley to the Westside.

Building transit is hard enough and it helps tremendously when the city and Metro — a county agency — are working together.

De la Vega previously served as a deputy for Mayor Richard Riordan, lives in the Valley and has been around local transportation issues going back to the 1990s. His nomination must be approved by the City Council. The press release from the mayor’s office and de la Vega’s bio are posted after the jump.

Please, please, please do a nationwide search for a new head for this vital city department. No more City Hall insiders that are beholden to the interests that pray on the city’s resources. We need an outsider who is concerned with actually making transportation in Los Angeles better and not just appeasing the developers and special interest groups at work here.